“I actually believe journalism must improve if the Times is asking people to pay for it, as readers are not going to pay for inaccurate rumour or propaganda. They can get that anywhere Ã¢â‚¬â€œ for free. What quality journalism can offer is synthesis of a great amount of material which is then verified and put into language everyone can understand.

I believe the experience and skills IÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve gained over 22 years as a journalist and writer have value which is why I donÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t give away my work for free. IÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ve written for the Times because they have valued what I do enough to pay me. The New Statesman magazine also asked me to write an article but they didnÃ¢â‚¬â„¢t want to pay me anything. To me, that shows how much they value quality journalism.

The TimesÃ¢â‚¬â„¢ paid model is just two weeks old but, still, a number of stats came through this weekend – none of them from the horseÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s mouthÃ¢â‚¬Â¦

First, the meat – some potentially significant first numbers on how successful the paperÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s paid websites have been in their first two weeks. ThereÃ¢â‚¬â„¢s no attribution for these, but the fact theyÃ¢â‚¬â„¢re reported by former Times media correspondent Dan Sabbagh might be some cause for validityÃ¢â‚¬Â¦